


trek (road to the pacific)

by saltytangerine



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Western, Diary/Journal, Implied Sexual Content, Kissing, M/M, POV First Person, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Skinny Dipping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:48:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24470809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltytangerine/pseuds/saltytangerine
Summary: In 2015, the journal of a James Barnes is found in California, in the possession of a relative.It might take a year, we’ll have to cross rivers, weave through mountain passes and miles of forests. It might take longer if we go too north and the snow brings a winter chill that tests his body, but we’ll get there. We’ll get to the west, I’ll show him the Pacific Ocean and maybe for the first time in months, I’ll see him smile again.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	trek (road to the pacific)

**Author's Note:**

> western au, i don't usually write in first person but i just have all sorts of feelings about bucky lamenting over steve. 
> 
> planned for three parts, i don't have a upload schedule though!

Journal of Bucky Barnes

May 3 1889

It might take a year, we’ll have to cross rivers, weave through mountain passes and miles of forests. It might take longer if we go too north and the snow brings a winter chill that tests his body, but we’ll get there. We’ll get to the west, I’ll show him the Pacific Ocean and maybe for the first time in months, I’ll see him smile again without me having to be the one to smile first. It'll be unprompted and I will live the rest of my life at peace.

We should be used to it; friends have left, gone to heaven and we have remained, stubborn and unwavering. Coughs and fevers come, but they never take him from me, maybe I take them from him, all I know is that he is still here, and sometimes, when he gets tired, I ask if I can join him up on his horse so he can fall asleep against me. Daisy’s reins in one hand, Cotton’s in the other and him leaning against me while under the afternoon sun is almost enough to make me forget what we have left behind. 

There was no one to say goodbye to, not once she closed her eyes for the last time with her hand loose in his. No brothers or sisters, he only sought comfort in my arms after the funeral, and I in his. The choice to leave is ours, ours alone, forged from a dream we shared as boys. The bags we packed were heavy at the start, but I carried them until we could afford our girls; I would have carried him, had he asked. 

There have been nights under the stars, feet warmed by the glowing coals of fires he started, orange and red dancing above the stack of sticks he picked up along the way, but I always tried my hardest to find us a roof over our heads at night, safe from the animals and bugs that bite at his skin. Me? I am impervious, built strong and thick skinned, a shield for him. I am always strong, gentle only for him and when he kisses me at night and holds me tight, I am nothing but as harmless as a breeze through the trees. 

This morning when I woke, he wasn’t by my side; the blankets held on to the last bits of warmth and his jacket was crumpled at the bottom of the tent. We rode too far from the path, no villages or towns could be seen on the horizon and with each inch the sun dropped in the sky, I knew that I had to find us somewhere to sleep. The tent is one of the only things we have left from Brooklyn, along with a single pair of gloves that I make him wear when the ice starts to form on the ground. He doesn’t usually rise first, I often have to shake him awake so we can start riding again, even after months of travelling, he still finds comfort in sleeping late into the morning, curled up to my bunched up jacket when I leave the bed. 

The water is safer after it has been boiled and I have kept a canteen full of water from the river by the campfire for that very purpose. The fire only smouldered by the time I emerged from the tent, but embers still remained, hot and red, and flames were easy to coax with a little breath and some dry twigs. We have two pots, blackened at the bottom from open flames, but they still are strong and they boil water and cook our food just fine. My trousers are no stranger to ashes, mostly at the knees from where I sit to awaken a fire from its slumber, but also finger shaped streaks of grey on my thighs where I try to brush off the ashes from the tips of my fingers.

I found him at the edge of the lake, his open shirt just resting over his shoulders, his bare skin still pale and a few bruises scattered along his side, a memory of his fall from Cotton last week. The instant I heard him hit the ground, it felt as if my soul had left my body; I usually ride behind him, to keep my eyes on him always, but it was late and the nearest settlement was just another mile away. He told me he was distracted, but still, I put him back in the saddle and walked alongside the horses, guiding them to the flickering lights of our home for the night. He is resilient though, although I suspect a small amount of that is driven by stubbornness. He had taken root on the grass this morning, under the tree. His hair a pale gold, it catches the light beautifully, it makes him seem as if he is glowing, a golden prince walking among us all. The hair on his arms and chest is soft and fine and lays flat as the hair on his head. I think about counting the freckles on his chest, his eyelashes, but he is shy and never believes me and only blushes when I tell him he is beautiful. 

Grass here is greener than home, it’s soft, not spiky, stabbing into our feet when we walk barefoot. In the mornings, dew chills the ground, leaving us with slippers made of water as we make our way to the river. We have been camped here for three nights, there is enough firewood here and it has become our home just on the outside of the forest, sat on the curve of the river is as safe, I think, as a boarding house. We ought to move today, I found myself thinking, find more food before we break into the forest. I don’t know how deep it goes, but I surely know that there is something on the other side of it, and maybe we are closer to the west than I thought. 

The grass cradled the backs of his thighs where he sat with his knees drawn up to his chest, his arms folded and resting on his knees. He smiled at me, squinting at the sun behind me, pink spread across his cheeks and his small hands red from the cold of the river. The shirt on his shoulders was only an attempt at appeasing me, stopping me in my tracks if I was to mention his skin turning red under the mid morning sun. The rest of his clothes sat folded neatly beside him, his vest in a perfect square on top of his faded blue trousers, socks rolled together to rest on the vest, he once told me he could face anything on our travels, but wet socks tested his tolerance the most. 

“It’s too cold to swim, Buck, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t try.” 

He sounded so proud of himself, and although my life is sworn to him; my sole purpose to love him and keep him safe, I was not upset. 

“Let’s see how cold it really is, champ.” Perhaps my famous last words, while I took my own shirt off and dropped it towards him, the grey cotton billowing in the still air before landing on his head. My shirts are bigger than his, he still doesn’t quite look his age; he turns twenty one this summer and when I stopped growing at nineteen, he stopped at fourteen. I don’t mind; I can tuck his head under my chin comfortably when we stand, one arm around him is enough to envelop him completely. I don’t know what possessed me to shed my clothes, to dare to swim, it was still so early, and his warning was not enough to stop me, the blue water seemed to sparkle like the gems I had seen in the museum in the city, tempting me in. 

He was surely right; it was far too cold to swim. The first step almost hurt, knives jabbing into my foot and I had only stepped in enough for the water to lap at my ankles. I thought what I would do if I was on the shore and Stevie was in the water and with no amount of shame, I knew that I would push him in; once you’re in and over the first shock, the cold dissipates and becomes comforting. I took a few more steps in, off the natural ledge that the river had carved into the bank and turned to face him. 

“It’s not that cold! Come get back in, it’ll wake you up!” 

“I already _am_ awake!” I heard him call back, but the next sound I heard was water splashing as I threw myself back into the embrace of the cold. I was sure that I had turned into an ice block, slowly freezing over until the sun could thaw me out. It was only an instant, however, and I made myself quiet, swallowing the urge to yell out, but almost as soon as the cold had shocked me, it stopped hurting, it felt strangely warm, and against all better judgement, I wanted him to join me. 

His face was red when he waded in, but he is not one to be outdone and soon as he was close enough, he too launched himself in, only a whimper escaping his lips. I caught him when he went under, but he emerged, grinning from ear to ear, golden hair soaking and plastered to his head. He is breathtaking, beautiful, strong, and he’s mine to hold and I his. I could spend hours kissing him, even in the icy water, naked and too cold to shiver. He is shorter than me, but that doesn’t determine anything between us, he doesn’t _need_ me to look after him, though I do try. I don’t know how long we stood, his arms over my shoulders, on his tiptoes while we kissed, I only took notice when he started to pull away and take me back to the bank. 

The grass isn’t as high here as it was when we rode through Indiana, but it is high enough that it tickled his face when he laid back, stretched out on the ground. We don’t talk in moments like these, no words seem to be enough when I want to kiss every inch of him. He’s always warm as soon as my skin is on his, when we’re together like this, nothing hurts. Nothing aches, no matter how long we have ridden the previous day, no matter how many hours we have been awake, not when we’re so close, as one person. My thighs never ache when I’m on his lap; he keeps me warm, full, loved and secure. Today, my thighs were where his hands belonged. There was no cause for hurry, not today with no soul around for miles. The morning was soaked up by our love, the sun high in the sky when he finally reached for the water that I had put to boil hours before. I made no effort to move, I was content to let the afternoon swallow me up and keep me by his side, my skin warm and golden compared to his fairness. 

It makes me sleepy, it makes me want to cling to him and not let him go until he pushes at my chest, wriggling free from my grip and by that time, I am usually half asleep and only let him go with a small amount of reluctance. We laid under the sun, one of his legs still between mine, sipping water and talking quietly. I told him about the places we can go once we make it through the forest, he asked if we could go south. Through is the way we must go though, and I suppose we can leave tomorrow and have today for ourselves. 

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on [twitter!](http://www.twitter.com/saltietangerine) i try to talk about stucky a lot, but honestly, at the moment i am kind of caught up in the honeymoon period with my gf cooking me dinner every night (alt text: working a fulltime job sucks)


End file.
